Los Angeles, 40s of the last century, pot-bellied sedans drive through the streets, and in a village called Hollywood films about strongly smoking men in hats, which will be called "Noir" a little later. Six decades later, the Australian studio will try to do the same work Team Bondi (founded by Brendan McNamar, the author of the vile GTA clone The Getaway ), but time, as usual, will make its own adjustments.
At the time of Billy Wilder, a black and white film helped to create an atmosphere of dreary hopelessness. L.A. Noire -The game is bright, sunny, but the mood conveys the mood of hopeless black and white longing. It is worth only a few hours to spend alone with Felps's fasting physiognomy and his no less shameful daily everyday life, as you will immediately want to pour unnecessed whiskey and move a closer to the charged revolver.
Dark city
What is l.A. Noire, no one really understood until the very end. Now everyone has already forgotten about it, but Team Bondi (Do not forget that Rockstar acts only by the publisher) announced the game back in 2004, and for quite some time it seemed to the public something like " Mafia On the contrary ": a large three -dimensional city, chases, shootings and criminal drama, only with cops in the main roles. The fact that the player would have to take part in investigations also spoke for a long time, but until a certain point in doubt, that detective work would be paid at least a little more attention than in the same Batman: Arkham asylum , where the so -called "detective regime" served as a link between fights and a picture dive on a cloak.
In fact, investigations in l.A. Noire is the flesh and blood of gaming mechanics, and the magnificent three-dimensional Los Angeles, chase and shooting-just tinsel. Cole Felps, protagonist L.A. Noire, an ordinary patrolman with the face of actor Aaron Staton, does not look too much on a cool noir detective, but really wants to investigate things on his own, and not be a manual monkey in men in hats. Having found successfully laid out evidence at the place of murder and independently delaying a couple of criminals, Cole after half an hour of the game changes the uniform to a strip suit and plunges into a new Los Angeles-cruel, gloomy and dirty for himself. Having risen to the detective of the slaughter department, he goes to the places of crimes with his partner, busily twists in his hands (without even putting on gloves – then they didn’t think about it very much), interviews witnesses, brings several addresses to the notebook, which should be visited, and he should be visited, and then, stinking stranglingly, tries to add the overall picture of the crime. All this from the outside can be accepted for the most ordinary police quest originally from the 90s, only in 3D and with a huge budget. But this quest, of course, is greatly simplified: there are no stupid enforcement of objects, short conversations. Puzzles, respectively, is also not: all conclusions and decisions follow from interrogations and evidence by themselves, and in the end you just need to put on the suspect handcuffs.
Interrogations are the most interesting thing in L.A. Noire. Felps in the notebook show a number of topics that can be affected in a conversation with one or another suspect. You ask a question and, listening to the answer, carefully follow the facial expressions of the interlocutor. Mimic, by the way, is completely unprecedented for video games – forget about Heavenly Sword And Enslaved. The developers have not just demonstrated in pre -release video the process of digitizing real actors and called on many roles of serial celebrities. And the same Staton (Mad Men), Greg Grunberg, John Nawble and others not in vain eat their bread – when you look at some characters, it even becomes a little scary (some are so afraid of wax figures – they seem to be terribly similar people, but you know that not people).
During the interrogation, after each replica of the interlocutor, they offer a choice of three reactions: believe the opponent, openly accuse him of lies or carefully notice that he, go, hides something. It is a pity that the focus with facial animation is purely nominal: in most cases you already know who will lie to you and who will tell you the truth. Perhaps the best description of this part l.A. Noir Dali, with the lips of the scraping Stan Marsh, the authors of the South Park series: “You need to buy a game in FIG, then sit in front of the TV, listen to endless dialogs and press on X?"
Police story
Deep down l.A. Noire differs from classic police quests only by technology and budget.
Police Quest
Police Quest is a classic detective adventure, which was also developed by former policeman James Walls, who retired after injury. From classic Point & Click Series mutated to the Tactical shooter SWAT 3, which, like a fourth part, is also largely similar to l.A. Noire: Standards of a policeman, nothing superfluous.
Blue Force
Another game of Walls, this time in the plot is an angry classic: the father of the protagonist, Jake Ryan, was a cop, but he died during his performance, and his murder was never disclosed. Jake, of course, conducts a semi -legally investigation and simultaneously displays several traitors in the police department to clean water. Such a story would be very to the place in l.A. Noire.
SAM & Max: Hit the Road
On l.A. Noire Sam and Max are similar in that all the great noir production synthesize in the same way, they only do it much more meaningful (no matter how strange it may sound to the hypertrophied version of “who set up Roger’s rabbit”), with all proper turns and archetypes. If you leave behind the brackets the fact that this is a comedy about a talking dog and a rabbit-psychopath, Hit the Road can easily be given as an example of how exactly you need to use jazz and felt hats in video games.
Dark street
The search for criminals always proceeds according to a similar scheme. We found evidence, went to a new place, talked there with someone, got a new clue, went on. In climax, sometimes shootings, fights or chases occur, but it is better not to remember them: it was much more interesting to shoot even in Mafia 2 , The assault ends after two strokes and the flying hat, and the boring automobile episodes in most cases can be completely missed by transferring the control of the partner. It’s simply disgusting to drive on your own: the last time such senseless and hackshots of cars was, it seems, in The Godfather: The Game.
The funny thing is that in many respects a purely decorative detective component, and the rudimentary action want to forgive and understand. Firstly, in any case, we are given the opportunity to admire the post-war Los Angeles. And he in l.A. Noir looks that it can easily claim the title of the most meticulously recreated city in the history of video games. The game produces a particularly strong impact on those who have been in real Los Angeles. Secondly, it was obvious that the main thing in l.A. Noire- a story that must certainly be collected from a huge number of film and literary quotes.
And here is just the main disappointment lies. L.A. Noire, as it turns out, is very similar to the series Life : Potentially interesting heroes scurry on the screen, but instead of telling you something about them, you are slipped by the next murder, the details of which you forget about a second after the criminals are bought in bracelets. All 20 cases in the game are practically unrelated episodes that do not push the story forward in any way. Moreover, this very story until a certain point as if it does not exist at all. Felps is the hero of the war with the mysterious past, there are flashbacks from the Second World War, some through heroes, but all this flashes in the frame so rarely (and it comes together only at the very end), that during the investigation you will forget, who is there that what is there that what is there. I did it and who is the name. When in l.A. Noir, serial killers appear, you think that now cunning conspiracies and betrayals will begin, now everything will spin! But in reality, this only means that the evidence will become slightly larger, and interrogations – a little longer.
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The main character of the novel “Above the abyss in rye” said that the real creators are those who want to call. Just like, chat in a friendly manner. Authors l.A. Noir are neat and meticulous, but they are not able to undergo such a check. Team Bondi made the most expensive, large -scale and ambitious detective quest in history, the material of which is enough for three brilliant games. And they are very interesting to listen when they excitedly tell how many photographs were sorted out to recreate Los Angeles of the 1947 model. They even undoubtedly love the same books and films as you. But, unfortunately, they cannot tell you anything about them that you would not Voodoo Dreams sister sites know for yourself.
P.S. By the way, be sure to look at the ingenious parody L.A. Noire in Real Life – These two and a half minutes cost all 20 hours of game.